


it's our paradise and it's our war zone

by r1ker



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-31
Updated: 2016-01-31
Packaged: 2018-05-17 08:02:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5860747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/r1ker/pseuds/r1ker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>california's too big for it to be full of just sousa, so a request is made, and subsequently delivered on.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> a big yes to the gay love tragedy, love that gay love tragedy
> 
> zayn, thanks for the title btw

Daniel figures it's inevitable after a while. He finds he can't do it all alone, can't run this whole division without the sets of hands he was used to having back at the other division of the SSR. So, one day when the chaos has just died down enough for him to sit down for longer than five minutes, he gives someone a call.

 

The phone rings only twice before its intended audience picks up on the other end. "Thompson."

 

Daniel clears his throat a little, didn't expect to get this caught up in recruiting Jack to come out to California to help the cause. "Jack, it's Sousa." Jack makes a little noise in response, almost a sound of gratitude. It hasn't been easy; going at it without someone he didn't know was going to leave this big a hole as he moved across the country.

 

"Knew you'd need me sooner or later," Jack says in that smarmy tone reserved only for Daniel, and Daniel smiles like he has a choice in the matter. A spot in him he hadn't hoped would go soft does when he thinks of Jack, thinks of the unsteady but always reassuring dynamic they managed together back in New York.

 

It makes no sense – he had to take a lot of guff from Jack when they first got started together, and then it became not wanting to give into the urge to give him a call when being out in California without familiar surroundings grew too sore. But then it does, he likes the way he and Jack can read each other without cracking open a book. That's something no one else in Daniel's life has or could ever manage to have.

 

And it's got to come out to California to be with him. If he's going to have any semblance of sanity after this stretch growing this division of the SSR, he's got to know he's got a familiar face near and dear. So he makes his offer in his mind first – Jack will come out on the next available plane, stay with Daniel until he's on his feet in the money department or itching with enough cabin fever to seek a place of his own, and they'll go from there.

 

It all sounds so perfect to him, a little too perfect, then he remembers he's actually got to ask Jack to put this plan into action. Not everything can be put into motion by his mind.

 

He has to clear his throat several times even before that can be done. Jack takes notice, asks against the muffled flurry of Daniel's thoughts, _you need anything out there, Sousa?_ And then Daniel takes the plunge.

 

"Come out here with me, Thompson," he asks and the other end of the phone goes silent in what he can only hope is contemplation of the proposal. "Come out here and give me a hand. I'll put you up until you get sick of me and you can give me what I can only hope is your expert and well-formed opinion on all I've got on my plate –"

 

"I'll be there," Jack blurts out before Daniel can finish what he's got to say. He backtracks a little, goes a few more seconds without speaking to make it look like he's not too eager about this whole thing. Jack takes in a little breath, something meant to change the tone into one with more causality than random. "I mean, yeah. Give me the time of the plane and I'll be on it."

 

"Really?" Daniel asks incredulously. Not only is he surprised Jack said yes to dropping everything and coming out halfway across the country to give someone like him a hand in his job, but the quickness with which he responded implies something he's not going to bring up right now.

 

"Yeah," Jack says casually, "what else have I got waiting here for me?" On his end of the line Daniel grins sheepishly, aware no one's watching him so he can be as receptive to this as he pleases, but he tries to subdue it. Can't let it out that this can mean more than it does.

 

So that becomes of that. The next day Daniel arranges the plane tickets, pays for them out of his own pocket to not let Peggy in on the not-really-a-ruse he's formed. It's not a lot at all so it leaves him enough to have one last dinner by himself the night before Jack is due back in town.

 

To think that in a few short hours the other chair at the table could be filled by Jack's presence if Daniel was cordial enough to ask him out for a night on the town like he's wanted to for so long makes him smile behind his glass of iced tea. No one else in the restaurant shoots him a second glance as he pays the bill and gets back out to the open night to hail a cab.

 

He can't sleep that night when he does manage to get himself to bed around midnight. Every noise in his apartment becomes more apparent when he starts thinking about how someone else can cause them and will be causing them soon rather than something outside getting bumped in the night.

 

Fleetingly he asks himself where Jack will be sleeping, putting his things; will his suits, his dress shirts go alongside Daniel's meager wardrobe in the open-faced closet facing his Murphy bed? Will his shoes buddy up with Daniel's, only to be tossed aside in the morning rush to get ready for the cab ride to the office?

 

He knows he's indulging himself too much in the fantasy, making much more out of very little, and he tries to stop himself, only to fail when he thinks about Jack's toothbrush next to his in the hole in the wall the realtor had called the "luxurious bathroom." It's going to be nice having someone to come back home to – though not in that way, he's not there yet on that front – but just knowing that there will be another presence to make cracks in the overbearing solitude living out in California has plagued him with is enough to make him drift back into easy but still excited sleep.

 

He wakes up the next morning and first finds the only clock in the room, wanting nothing more than to know how much time is left to wait out until he can begin the ride to the airport to collect Jack. It's just around 7:30 in the morning – the plane touches down at 11:00, then there'll be a short time in which Jack will begin the never-ending corral to secure all his luggage – so he tries to make best use of the time as he sees fit.

 

For the first time that he can really remember he cleans his apartment, puts away the shoes and books he's only just tossed about in his day-to-day activities. A broom in the corner gets put to use taking away traces of dust on the floorboards, a rag in wiping down the L-shaped counter he's used as a kitchen table in days past, and Daniel falls down onto his sofa with a sigh, a little tuckered out in getting his living space in tip-top shape for a second occupant.

 

Then he glances at his wristwatch following a series of cups of coffee, finds it to be 10:30, more than appropriate to go out into town to begin the journey. He makes quick work of a cab, sounds a little too excited when he mentions his destination being the airport, and the cabbie just agrees with an exhale, turns the wheel to get them back out into traffic.

 

Daniel watches the cityscape pass by like he is disposed to when in a cab by himself. It hasn't changed a bit in the time he's been in his apartment, people still buzzing about in their lives basking in the glamour only Los Angeles can provide. He envies them when he dwells on it too much, wishes he had the social and emotional capacity to do the schmoozing every single day in and out. But then he likes his solitude, likes knowing that someone he can do all the schmoozing he'd care for is on his way to him right now.

 

The airport is alight with people in and out for whatever holiday happens to be passing at this moment in time; Daniel can't tell, the days seem to meld together when you live the life he does. What he does know is the New York flight is on its way down the runway, wheels gliding gently into the landing zone and he goes closer to the gate the marquee ahead says the plane's occupants will be arriving at.

 

The people begin unloading one after the other, some in hoards Daniel believes to be families just in town to begin soaking up the atmosphere, others businessmen and women with a goal in sight. Then he finds the one meant for him, looking rather clueless with a worn leather duffel bag in one hand. He smiles big, large enough to where no one could tell from a distance it's hurting him to stay this far away from Jack when they've been apart longer than they seemed to been made to be.

 

He doesn't want to break into a mad dash – that's just a little too much, too desperate for what he really wants to do – but what he does do is pick up the pace outside his usual stride and Jack sees him right away, plucks him out of the crowd without a hitch. Jack's smile is almost as dazzling as the sun pouring in from the countless window to his right and Daniel's left.

 

They stop just inches from each other, tips of their dress shoes threatening to collide in their final resting stances. Daniel's a little out of breath – maybe or maybe not he had stumbled those last few feet to Jack, heart racing only a little, just enough to really perk him up and this close to Jack he can see the beard that's been neglecting to have been shaved over the last few weeks, the lines around his mouth where it's still quirked into a satisfied grin.

 

"Hi," Daniel breathes out, "hi there. Sorry, I…" He trails off when he finds it hard to speak without almost laughing at how relieved he is to finally have a familiar face around him again. Jack doesn't know what to do either so he settles for wrapping Daniel in an unexpected and awkwardly arranged hug that does more than enough to let them both feel grounded again.

 

"No, you're fine," Jack excuses with his face just past Daniel's shoulder. "Bet you've been sticking it out here all alone. I know Peggy came out to see you earlier, yeah?" Daniel nods – she did, but even that wasn't enough to stop him from feeling like he was the only person in the world sometimes – and Jack bows his head. "I'm glad to be here, you know. Don't think you bothered me asking what you did."

 

"I'm not," Daniel mumbles because his voice can't get strong enough now to refute what he was initially thinking about this whole thing. What if Jack didn't want this, didn't want him around? He almost couldn't handle himself once he began to hang onto the idea of there being someone else in Jack's life that wouldn't want this at all.

 

That would be the worst-case scenario, Jack having no desire to move everything out far west to somewhere he probably hadn't been to before was the least of his concerns if there was another person Jack couldn't bear to leave. But that's not the case. Not if Jack is real, standing before him right now, holding his arms in a loose rest at the small of Daniel's back in what the passersby could only hope was a brotherly embrace.

 

"I know you, not well, but I know you enough to understand what's going on in that head," Jack says with one of his knuckles touching gently at the gelled hair at Daniel's temple. "I'm glad to be out here. There's a whole lot you've got left to take care of, uh, Detective Sousa?"

 

"Chief Sousa," Daniel corrects through a grin, one Jack mirrors in his own charming way. They pull back enough to face each other then find their bodies coming together again in a more fulfilling hug, a follow up to the first one that makes Daniel dizzy with the smell of Jack's cologne in his nose. God was it terrible the first few days they worked together but now it's the greatest thing he can hope to compare to.

 

Jack mentions in the cab ride out from the airport that lunch ought to be had to celebrate his arrival in Los Angeles, and Daniel couldn't agree more. He had worked off his meager breakfast preparing the apartment for Jack, and knowing he wouldn't have to eat alone for the foreseeable future further fuels his desire to go out to a fancy restaurant and eat a meal with him trimmed with everything they can think of.

 

So that's what they do, Jack even going as far as to usher Daniel to their assigned table by way of a hand on the small of his back, and for a fleeting second Daniel thinks he's going to go as far as to pull the chair out for him. He doesn’t, of course, and sits at the other end of the table still with a satisfied smirk on his face.

 

They give the menu a few once-overs and silently pick what they want, recant it to their rather polite waitress not putting an emphasis on quick like they would have had to back in bumbling New York, and spend the time waiting for their meal regarding each other in comfortable quiet. Jack looks around the restaurant throughout, gives a wheezy little laugh when it finally sinks in where he's situated himself now in the country, having lunch at a ritzy restaurant with someone he never thought would become his friend.

 

Daniel can see Jack's beard coming through more now, not just after a few days of neglected shaving, and for all the world he'd like to reach out and touch it. He didn't like it at first, preferred all his colleagues to be clean-shaven if he had an opinion on the issue, but Jack's face becomes more rugged than achingly handsome with the addition of the facial hair.

 

"Not shaving looks pretty good on you, Jack," Daniel finally can't help but comment and Jack sits up his chair a little straighter, wiggling a little like he's trying to show off the fact that he's grown up enough to grow something more than blond peach fuzz. Daniel runs a hand over his own smooth jaw. "Wish I could. I just look dirty if I don't shave."

 

Jack smiles with every feature he can do it with and Daniel answers that with his face flushing hot. The food comes before it can turn into too much of Daniel pining helplessly at the sight of someone he wishes he could stop himself from loving in the way he does. Daniel eats daintily like Jack can see anything over the sight of the steak he's currently attacking.

 

Lunch is made quick work of and they sit back observing the plates made clean by their efforts. Jack wishes he had the strength to ask for dessert – something on the menu had caught his eye when he was looking it over and if it became a matter if he was too full, maybe Daniel could sidle up with another fork or spoon and help him out – but he asks for the check instead, sends it away with a few bills and the instructions for the waitress to keep the change as a sign of his gratitude for a job well done, a good lunch served. She blushes about as hard as Daniel did earlier and walks off in a flurry.

 

Jack gets up from the table, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet. He looks down where Daniel's still sitting and with a quick raise of his eyebrows beckons him outside where they can make their way back to Daniel's apartment. Daniel goes as is his duty.

 

In no time they're waiting outside Daniel's apartment and never before has he found it hard to get his hand around his key to unlock the door. Jack waits just as expectantly with his own bags in hand. Daniel finally stops, shoves the key back into his pocket. He can't go any further without getting off his chest. He can't let Jack go without knowing that there's much more behind this move than he had initially let on in that first phone call.

 

He turns around to Jack, who's looking at him curiously as to why they're not inside in the middle of the dime tour of the apartment, and puts his hands on his shoulders, kisses him square on the mouth as if there's anything else he'd ever want to do right now.

 

Jack freezes up not out of disgust but alarm – he really hadn't planned on being kissed, not after the lunch he just had, he would have wanted to have previous notice to maybe have a mint or something so he wouldn't feel like he was plaguing Daniel with his breath.

 

Daniel doesn't seem to mind. He lets his head dip more at an angle to allow himself more of Jack's mouth as it opens beneath his. The bag and key get forgotten on the floor at their feet, tangling together just as their bodies do as Jack gets his arms around Daniel again. He likes the way Daniel feels so slight next to him, despite the two of them being around the same height.

 

They pull back when the urge to breathe, extinguish the fire burning in their lungs brought on by kissing for far too long, becomes all too much. Daniel is looking at Jack to see if this is going to send him for the hills like he had a feeling it was going to the minute he decided to go in for the kill.

 

"That's why I had to have you out here with me," Daniel confesses with a heady sigh, "I had to have that. If I had to go another second without it, I'd have –" He's shut up again by Jack's mouth, moving in to take in more of him than the first time. The door gets unlocked by Daniel's blind hand, the bags get kicked in the doorway by Jack's foot, and if they find themselves pillowed on the single Murphy bed after the door's been shut, no one else has to know. No one but the now two people living on the third floor in the room before the staircase.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i wasn't finished yet and neither were they

They lie on the made-up bed for a few minutes, still trying to catch their breath. Jack ends up pillowed on Daniel's chest with his ear to his heart, listening to it stay one beat behind his. He won't know for sure what all of this means, what it will come to mean in the days ahead, but for now it's good.

 

Daniel clears his throat and looks down at Jack as much as he can in their current position. "Where are you going to sleep? Only one bed in this whole joint." A pause and he's close to slapping himself when what he said implies otherwise to what just happened. "You can always sleep in the bed with me. The couch out there isn't too comfortable."

 

Jack hums in the back of his throat and nods, figures that sounds just fine. He's never minded the few times he's had no choice but to sleep on a couch but if he's got a say in the matter he'd rather stay right here with Daniel. With that he rolls off of him, pressing his lips to Daniel's forehead on his way up from the bed, and goes to the kitchen for a glass of water to soothe his dry throat.

 

Now alone on the bed Daniel takes a few seconds to gather his thoughts. It worked, better than he ever could have planned, and Jack didn't turn away. He didn't run at the thought of Daniel wanting him in the way he did. He's going to stick with this even if his mind strays off like it likes to do. Now his brain is pretty quiet so he too rises from the bed, tugs his shirt back down from where Jack's hands had rucked it up, and toes off his shoes to settle in more.

 

The glass of water Jack comes back into the living room with turns into two glasses of iced tea for the two of them. They sit on the couch with knees barely touching, Jack's voice soft as he speaks of his final days in New York, particularly the one where he broke the news to Peggy that he'd be no longer in her company after a while.

 

"She wasn't too happy with me at first," Jack confesses and Daniel figured; she had been quite stubborn when he was the first to go out to Los Angeles. He can't blame her – he's never been too keen to change too. But it's change for the better, at least for him anyway. "But then I let her know I'd be staying with you." Again Jack smiles in that radiant way he did earlier at lunch. "That made her happy. For a second she thought I was going out to California to rough it or something."

 

"Nope, you're stuck with me for as long as you'd like," Daniel sighs as one of his hands finds its way to Jack's knee to rest there comfortably. Jack too moves his hand to cover Daniel's. A light squeeze makes Daniel's stomach do a flip that borders dizzy.

 

"I don't think I'd rather be stuck with anything else," Jack says truthfully. He skates his fingers over Daniel's hand on his knee one more time before moving back. If every moment from now on proves to be as settling as this one, he'll stay stuck with Daniel forever.

 

That night they've gone their separate ways in getting ready for bed, Jack in the adjoining bathroom brushing his teeth and Daniel tugging on his sleep clothes in a corner of the closet with the floor-length mirror. Daniel's chest aches nervously when he considers what he's about to do, share a bed with someone for the first time like this. He starts going over everything he thinks he does in his sleep and how Jack could respond – the worst case scenario to him is Jack finding out he snores.

 

The light in the bathroom turns out and Jack moves around the room making sure the other lamps are properly turned off before they go to sleep. All is found to be in ship shape and he sits on the corner of the bed waiting for Daniel to join him. He lies down in the bed first, turning back the sheets to take up his side after seeing that all the little knick-knacks on the other deemed it to be Daniel's.

 

Jack pats Daniel's pillow to beckon him closer. He smiles like Daniel can see his face in the darkness and relaxes with a small exhale when he does, climbing in to lie down on his side facing Jack. They sidle up closer together, noses brushing as the pillows beneath them give way a little.

 

Here Daniel can see everything he was previously ignoring about Jack like a fool. The smell of Jack's hair pomade catches in his nose from when he wisely styled his hair before bed to save time in the morning. Notes of bar soap and the scent of Jack's skin join it and Daniel can't stop himself from taking in a deep breath of it. It's nice to have something else there that's not the cheap laundry detergent he'd been using on the sheets.

 

Jack's hand moves from by his leg beneath the sheet to high on Daniel's chest where some of it is exposed by the straps of his undershirt. His thumb is soft, warm against Daniel's collarbone and it's answered by a kiss to Jack's forehead, a hand brushing against the back of his head.

 

"You alright with this?" Jack whispers to him and Daniel nods, finds that he's more than okay with this arrangement. Now more than ever he wants to go to sleep to know what it's like to not suffer the ache of loneliness upon waking up in the morning. Jack appears to have other plans when he moves himself to loom over Daniel, one hand anchoring him above him to kiss him.

 

Daniel opens up under his mouth with a huff of breath, arranges himself beneath the covers to put pressure off of his hip and his side so he can be fully committed to this. Jack continues on above him, their jaws rolling together lazily as Daniel's hands slide down the small of Jack's back to tug at the band of his sleep shorts.

 

"Lay back," Jack instructs when the excitement in him grows all too much to keep playing around like this. Daniel follows suit and rolls flat on his side of the bed, resting high up against the pillows on the bed and letting Jack go where he must. Where he must is just over Daniel's lap, his cock as it starts to gain interest. He takes special care not to put too much pressure on Daniel's leg and pulls down his shorts, hand reaching back to stroke feather light against his groin.

 

"I can't, I –" Daniel grunts out when Jack's hand wraps around his dick, stroking him to full hardness now, the tip brushing wetly against the high point of Jack's ass. Jack breathes out, having not done this in a long time but thankfully still remembering what he knows can make people tick.

 

"I'm not going to hurt you, I know," Jack placates while he reaches over to rummage through the first drawer of the nightstand where he knows Daniel keeps the things he uses when he can't help but give into himself. He returns to his kneeling position with a noise of triumph and a tube between his fingers.

 

His hand can't stop shaking as he does away with the cap and takes enough between two fingertips to begin opening himself up even on top of Daniel. His knees burn with staying like this for so long but if he stops now, gives in to that singe of his muscles, he'll ruin what he's establishing for himself in that he wants to give Daniel everything, regardless of what his body says. "Trust me, you can trust me."

 

He keeps Daniel preoccupied during this by letting him stroke Jack's cock up against his belly, like he's not aching enough already. A few times he has to put his free hand to Daniel's wrist, tell him to let back if he wants this to keep on for longer than five seconds. Daniel takes the clue and goes back to letting the tips of his fingers brush against the space beneath Jack's balls that make his knees weaken.

 

Jack's fingers continue to work and his breath is stolen almost instantly by two, then three of them in quick succession. If he had done this in the past, when he was younger, he'd have already come and gone just like that. But with Daniel, more special to him than he would have wanted to make him, he finds himself wanting to draw it out just as long as he and Daniel can hold on to chase the end together.

 

Soon he's as ready as he'll ever be to take something that's not his own digits and he lets them slip out of him with a breathy sigh, trailing them along the top of Daniel's thigh softly to see his response. Daniel's eyes, caught in a beam of moonlight that's found its way through curtains and windowpanes to bounce off into his blown pupils, droop with pleasure. He works to help Jack onto him and once Jack is fully seated, ass pressing down onto Daniel's groin with little pressure on his leg, the eyes close in bliss.

 

Jack can't shake the tremor that being full sends through him. His thighs are quivering with the effort to keep his cool, not wanting to move just yet, rather seeking to acclimate himself to the feel. There's not much to get used to, just all-consuming solidarity. His head is devoid of air, of any solid ground to seek. For the first time in his life he's at a new level of bliss.

 

He doesn't even think as he begins to move, doing it mindlessly and without prompt, be it his brain or Daniel's hands. Everything in him shuts off to concentrate efforts into drawing out the most pleasure, ears honing in on the raspy sound that ekes out of Daniel as Jack fucks himself on him.

 

Opening his eyes he looks down and sees Daniel's rolled his eyes up to gain view of the headboard. His mouth is parted a little favoring breathing in shallowly through here rather than his nose. The sweat beading on his forehead threatens to follow a track down his temple where other drops have fallen.

 

God, he's beautiful. There isn't a picture Jack can think of, right now anyway, that could compare to the sight of Daniel deep in something not comprised of turmoil or concern. Both of them lie on the same ledge, feet dangling over the edge with an invisible force tugging them closer and closer to the precipice to fall fully down.

 

Jack soon realizes Daniel's trying to say something but can't for the tremulous bubble caught in his throat. He tries and tries to get it out, gasps a few times to try and clear it, and soon it finds its way out into the air. "Jack, Jack, please –"

 

"You're okay, I've got you," Jack reassures as he speeds up, falls up and down on Daniel's cock, taking it in base to tip in dizzying, quick thrusts. Soon even he threatens to break down and finish early, the brushes against his prostate causing him to groan like he's in pain with how steady and powerful the current being sent up his spine as a result is.

 

The headboard Daniel was regarding early on taps against the wall at first then moves in an all out rattle against the wall. Jack hopes fleetingly that the people on the other side are heavy sleepers because when Daniel starts to buck into Jack's movements it hits against a few parts of it pretty hard.

 

Daniel comes back to himself enough to finish stroking Jack off until he's shouting out with release, stopping long enough to begin coming onto Daniel's chest with a series of agonized groans. He had been holding out for so long that it's damn near blissful, his vision going hazy at the edges and his hearing blanking out for the roar in his ears.

 

Jack finishes and he's struggling to breathe, finding his ability to take air in and out and put it to use when he sees how Daniel is regarding him even with his hips still working. He sees Jack like one would observe a work of art, eyes filled with rapt attention taking in every detail he can while still maintaining his poise thrusting languidly into him. His release is on the horizon, hands shaking where they grip Jack's hips for leverage. Jack puts his hands on his with that, feeling them struggling to keep an even hold.

 

"Come on," Jack urges with a light voice still weak from climax. "Come on, it's okay, you're alright." Daniel nods, swallows hard from the way his throat bobs, and comes hard inside Jack with a muffled groan. It's some time after that he's able to look up at Jack for reassurance, and he's met with a nod.

 

Jack finds himself aching when he rolls himself off of Daniel's lap, drawing up the rumpled sheets to cover the both of them up. The mess, they'll deal with in the morning. For now they devote their attention to each other once more, huddling up close like before, Jack letting his mouth press against Daniel's again and again while feeling his breath hiss shakily from his pursed lips.

 

"I love you, so much," Jack sighs when Daniel wraps himself around him, squeezing in a loose hug. "I'm glad you called me." Daniel nods against his shoulder. He's glad too, mostly because there was a solution to this, that he didn’t have to go without this if he just made a move. With that they both fall asleep still arranged around one another.


End file.
